just to hijack things more, there's also the breakaway states of Washington and Oregon, which uses their own rating system for most scholastic tournaments held there. Which confuses the hell out of everyone every time players from these states play in the Nationals - their ratings are always like 500 USCF points underrated.

Well, all scholastic players ought to be on a different system anyway. The large number of players who aren't really players biases the ratings downward, which not only restrains the ratings of the actual players, but also causes deflation in the greater pool as those players migrate into it.